The Cannibal Hymn to Pharaoh Unis(ca.2378 - 2348 BCE)
UNIS the overpowering cannibalistic god
and image of images
a few philosophical remarks ...

by Wim van den Dungen

the cartouche of "wnis"
Unis, Unas or Wenis

"For Pharaoh is the great power that overpowers the powers.
Pharaoh is a sacred image, the most sacred image
of the sacred images of the great one.
Whom he finds in his way, him he devours bit by bit."Cannibal Hymn - Pyr. 407a-c

The "Cannibal Text" (Frankfort)
or "Cannibal Hymn" (Mercer, Faulkner) is an extraordinary
literary document. It consists of two spells (Pyramid
Texts 273 & 274) inscribed on the East gable of the antechamber of the tomb
of Pharaoh Unis (Unas or Wenis, ca. 2378 - 2348 BCE, the last king of the Vth
Dynasty (ca. 2487 - 2348 BCE) and his successor Pharaoh Teti (ca. 2348 - 2198
BCE), who initiated the VIth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2670 - 2205 BCE).

"The spells then drop out of the
regular corpus, to reappear in the Middle Kingdom, when the Cannibal Hymn is
included among the Pyramid Texts of the Middle Kingdom tombs of Senwosretankh at
Lisht and of Siese at Dahshur. A reworked version appears as Coffin Text Spell
573, while a variety of phrases and themes from the hymn also recur in other
Coffin Texts." - Eyre, 2002, p.11.
The major theme of this text, the praise of Pharaoh, allows us to classify it as
a hymn. Its main metaphorical and dramatical mechanism, namely Pharoah eating
the deities, puts its acute poetical power into evidence. Degustation (like
the spitting and masturbating Atum) is used as a material metaphor of
transcendence. Pharaoh's consumption of the gods makes him akin to the
precreational order of Atum (manifesting as Re, the father of the king). Some
deities and the natural order of creation are left behind.

As a metaphor of unity, the divine king holds the division of the balance in
harmony. His power is precisely mastership over the chaotic waters ("Nun"),
actualized every year by a "good Nile" (an inundation kept between the extremes
of too much or too little water - cf. the Balance of Maat). In the kinglist on the
Palermo Stone (Vth Dynasty), the name of the king figures above compartiments
recording, for each regnal year, the height of the inundation. The authority of
the king was defined by his ability to sustain good inundations. Some argue that
on the Scorpion mace-head (ca. 3000 BCE), we see the king, helped by attendants,
ritually excavate an irrigation canal.

"The institution of kingship was projected as the sole force which held the
country together, and the dual nature of the monarchy was expressed in the
king's regalia, in his titulary, and in royal rituals and festivals. This
concept -the harmony of opposites, a totality embracing pared contrasts- chimed
so effectively with the Egyptian world-view that the institution of kingship
acquired what has been called a 'transcendent significance'. This helps to
explain the centrality of the institution to Egyptian culture, and its
longevity." -
Wilkinson, 2001, p.185, quoting
Frankfort, 1948.
In this exceptional hymn, synonymous parallelisms, in the form of resemblance,
correspondence and similarity, are common, as well as a sixfold metrical scheme.
The object of this song of praise, usually a deity, is Pharaoh, which is rather
exceptional (although auto-deification is not unseen in Ancient Egypt). Although
the confirmation of Pharaoh's excellence is consistent with the rest of the
texts found in the tomb of Unis, and we indeed read how Pharaoh reigns over
the deities and is feared by them, in the Cannibal Hymn a step
further is taken : Pharaoh slays & eats the powers of the pantheon ! As
"power of powers", he transcends every divinity of creation and is the eldest of
the old. He is a god, who as a divine cannibal, metaphorically eating the other
deities and gulping down their spirits ...

"Along with the Sumerians, the Egyptians deliver our earliest -through by no
means primitive- evidence of human thought. It is thus appropriate to
characterize Egyptian thought as the beginning of philosophy. As far back as the
third millennium B.C., the Egyptians were concerned with questions that return
in later European philosophy and that remain unanswered even today - questions
about being and nonbeing, about the meaning of death, about the nature of the
cosmos and man, about the essence of time, about the basis of human society and
the legitimation of power." -
Hornung, 1992, p.13.

What is of philosophical interest in these two utterances of the Pyramid
Texts ?

the phenomenology of the
Pharaonic principle ;

the deification of Pharaoh ;

the position of Pharaoh
vis-à-vis the deities ;

the deities as natural
differentials.

1
The Pyramid of Pharaoh Unis

view of the sarcophagus
against the West wall of the burial-chamber

1.1
The pyramid of Pharaoh Unis.
The pyramid of Unis at Saqqara is at the south-western corner of
Pharaoh Djoser's enclosure (the Pharaoh who initiated the Old
Kingdom). It is almost diagionally opposed to the pyramid of Pharaoh
Userkaf (ca. 2487 - 2480 BCE), the founder of the Fifth Dynasty.

The causeway to the pyramid of Unis was 750 m long and was equal to
Pharaoh Khufu's. In its roof, a slit was left open, so a shaft of
light could illuminate the gallery of brightly painted reliefs, of
which only fragments survived. A wide array of scenes once covered the
wall : boats transporting granite palm columns, craftsmen working gold
& copper, harvesting scenes (grain, figs & honey), offering bearers,
battles with enemies, bearded "Aziatics" ... Two boat graves (each 45
m long) lay side by side South of it. By the New Kingdom, the complex
had fallen into ruins.

The antechamber of the pyramid tomb lies directly under the centre
axis of the pyramid. In the East, a doorway opens to the uninscribed
Ka-chamber with three recesses. The middle recess of this Ka-chapel
(intended for sitting statues of Pharaoh Unis ?), lies exactly behind
the false door of the mortuary temple.

Thesitting statue is attested in the funerary domain from the
Early Dynastic Period onwards. It is the three-dimensional realization
of the picture of the Slab-stela, representing the enthroned tomb
owner in front of an offering table, to which he is stretching out one
hand. The stretched (mostly right) hand is shown resting on the thigh,
the left hand often on the breast (but variants in gesture and garment
exist). During the IVth Dynasty, the sitting statue is a formal part
of the Giza cemetery. It was placed in a closed "serdab" (the Arabic
for "cellar"). In this "inner" cult place -dedicated to the provision
cult for the deceased- the Ka-statue is the "double" of the tomb
owner, representing the latter as corporally intact, provided and able
to receive provisions by way of the mummy enshrined in the
sarcophagus, and by way of the Ka and/or Ba visiting the tomb and
recognizing its own image in the Ka-statue.

► the Unis Texts and
the Pyramid Texts

The Unis Texts form the oldest extant corpus of religious texts
written in Old Egyptian. They are king Unis' literary testament. Together with those in the tombs of his
successors (Pharaohs Teti, Pepi I, Merenre & Pepi II), they constitute the oldest
corpus of Ancient Egyptian religious, funerary & theological
literature, in particular that of Heliopolis ("Iunu" in Egyptian, "On"
in the Bible), called the Pyramid Texts. Heliopolis was
situated to the north-east of the pharaonic and religious capital of
the Old Kingdom, namely Memphis, and on the east bank of the Nile (now
a Cairo suburb).

view of the sarcophagus against the West
wall of the burial-chamber

The inscriptions carved and filled with blue pigment
on most walls of the tomb underneath the Pyramid of Unis contain the first
historical account of the religion of the Old Kingdom. Although Heliopolitan in
inspiration, it contains Hermopolitan and Osirian components as well.

On the ceiling, golden, pentagram-like stars were carved in relief on a sky-blue
background. They represent the final goal of Pharaoh's journey to the sky of Re.

The tomb is made of Tura limestone, except for the West wall of the
burial-chamber and the western halves of its North and South walls, opposite the
ends of the sarcophagus, which are in albaster.

On the West wall, an elaborated panel design and a false door have been carved
and painted.

The Pyramid Texts have their own particular problems and difficulties.
They are a set of symbolical "heraldic" spells which mainly deal with the
promotion of Pharaoh's welfare in the afterlife. These spells were recited at
various ceremonies, mostly religious and especially in connection with the
birth, death, resurrection and ascension of Pharaoh. These texts are to a large
extent a composition, a compilation and joining of earlier texts which
must have circulated orally or were written down on papyrus many centuries
earlier. Some of these go back to the oral tradition of the Predynastic Period,
for they suggest the political context of Egypt before its final unification (as
Sethe pointed out). Others, although the archeological record is limited, were
used in this-life rituals, and have
initiatoric connotations.
The relative rarity of corruptions is another important fact which makes their
study rewarding.

"The Pyramid Texts were not the work of a single man or of a single
age. They are entirely anonymous and of uncertain date. And they are religious
literature which reflect more or less clearly the conditions of religious
thought in ancient Egypt previous to the Seventh Dynasty - more like the Psalms
than any other book of the Old Testament. None of them, however, seem to
have been composed for use in temples, though they may have in time been
arranged for the burial service of sovereigns, and as such, and in a definite
order, been inscribed on the chamber-walls of the pyramids ..." -
Mercer, 1956, p.2.This "eternalized" body of texts includes drama,
hymns, litanies, glorifications, magical texts,
offerings rituals, prayers, charms, divine offerings, the ascension of
Pharaoh, the arrival of Pharaoh in heaven, Pharaoh settled in heaven, and
miscellaneous texts. It is the oldest body of theology in the world, and
precedes the textualization of the Vedas (ca. 1900 BCE).

"... from internal references in the Vedic literature we
can now state with some certainty that the Rig-Veda was not composed, as
maintained by many scholars under the spell of the Aryan invasion model, around
1200 BC, but at least more than eight centuries earlier. The hymn
composers knew of an environment that simply ceased to exist around 1900 BC.
What more concrete evidence could anyone wish for ?" - Feuerstein, Kak & Frawley, 1995,
p.105.
In the ca. 650 years between ca. 3000 BCE (the beginning of the Dynastic
Period) and ca. 2348 BCE (the death of Pharaoh Unis), the written language had considerably developed. But although
words could be joined together in simple sentences and the latter in pragmatical
groups (dealing with honors & gifts, offices, legacies, inventories, testaments,
transfers, endowments, etc.), the additive, archaic quality of the literary
style was pronounced.

In the Old Egyptian of the Pyramid Texts, the composition between
semantic groups is
loose. Subjectivity is still objectified. Pre-operatoric activity is
limited by the immediate material context. Older structures were mingled with
new ones and many traces of earlier periods were left over. The extent of this
layeredness has been called in to reject the possibility of Ancient Egyptian
philosophy. The language, which has the style of the "records" of the Old
Kingdom, is often additive and offers little self-reflection (which starts with
the
literature of the First Intermediate Period).
Didactic poetry (precepts)
and lyrics in which
personal emotions & experiences
are highlighted are nearly absent.

Various types of parallelism occur : synonymous (doubling or by repetition),
symmetrical, combined, grammatical, antithetic, of contrast, of constraint, of
analogy, of purpose and of identity. Metrical schemes of two, three, four, five,
six, seven or eight lines occur (the fourfold being the most popular). The play
of words is the commonest literary feature and depends on the consonantal roots
of the words. Alliteration, metathesis, metaphors, ellipses, anthropomorphisms
and picturesque expressions are also found.

The contemporary school of egyptological literalism
equates the earliest temporal layer of any text with its historical date of composition, mistrusting
the presence of literary antecedents. In the case of the Pyramid Texts,
they would agree to push the date of inception with a few centuries (the margin
of error for this period being ca. 100 years) but try to avoid a
Predynastic figure. Indeed, comparisons with the architectural language of the
period, makes it likely that under Pharaoh Djoser (ca. 2654 - 2635 BCE), the Egyptians had the
conceptual framework of the Pyramid Texts at their disposal. King Djoser, the "inventor of stone" and his Leonardo da Vinci, Imhotep, the "great
seer" (or prophet) of Re at Iunu, "the Pillar", 40km northeast of Memphis (the
Greek Heliopolis, the Coptic area of contemporary Cairo), layed the foundations
of the Old Kingdom "canon" which ruled all aspects of the life of the Ancient Egyptian
elite,
including writing, art & religion.

The texts from the tomb of Unis are available
online as well as Sethe's standard edition of the Pyramid Texts (1910). This
exclusively royal funerary corpus consists of a series of "utterances",
so called because the expression "djed medu" ("Dd" = "words" ; "mdw" = "speech")
or "words to be said", i.e. "to recite" is, as a rule, at the head of most. In
Sethe's edition, 714 Utterances are given, whereas
Faulkner (1969)
brings the total to 759.

► Osirian faith & the
Pyramid Texts

When, in order to assure for himself -through the magic of his
great
speech- his ultimate realization in the afterlife, Pharaoh
Unis decided to adorn his tomb with sacred hieroglyphs, Osirian
faith was already popular and its incorporation in the Pharaonic
funerary rituals had already begun. So the name "Osiris" is inserted
before Pharaoh's name wherever it stands at the head of the utterance.
This is omitted in all cases when it occurs in the text (except in
Utterances 25 & 38).
Breasted (1912) concluded the editor must have
been "Osirian", working hastily and mechanically.

"While there is some effort here to correlate the functions of Re and Osiris,
it can hardly be called an attempt at harmonization of conflicting doctrines.
This is practically unknown in the Pyramid Texts. (...) But the fact that
both Re and Osiris appear as supreme king of the hereafter cannot be reconciled,
and such mutually irreconcilable beliefs caused the Egyptian no more discomfort
than was felt by any early civilization in the maintenance of a group of
religious teachings side by side with others involving varying and totally
inconsistent suppositions. Even Christianity itself has not escaped this
experience." - Breasted,
1972, pp.163-164.

sample of Unis 478 - 486
South wall of the antechamber

Although historical traces of Osirian
faith predating the Pyramid Texts are sparse, popular Osirian beliefs
had, during the previous Dynasties, already slowly infiltrated the Solar state
religion. Predynastic religion had identified Osiris with the fertile waters of
the inundation, with soil and vegetation (cf. Orion and the Dog-Star in the
South, the direction of the inundation). The ever-waning and ever-reviving life of
Egypt's soil through the Nile was entrenched by the story of the murder &
resurrection of Osiris and the triumph of his son Horus over Seth, the evil
uncle. As a result, and despite its popular origin, Osirian faith entered into
the most intimate relationship with the ideology of divine kingship, causing a fundamental
tension to be resolved later, when Osiris, as god of the dead and king of
the netherworld, was increasingly seen as the nocturnal aspect of Re (cf.
the New Kingdom Solar theology and
Netherworld books).

So, although the religion of the state was a Solar faith focused on Pharaoh, the
Pyramid Texts evidence an ambiguous relationship with Osiris, the god of the
common people and popular beliefs. The Predynastic Osiris cult, probably local
to the Delta, involved a forbidding, stern & repellent hereafter. Osiris was a
Nile-god and a spirit of vegetable life, a harvest-god. But, as a king of Egypt, he
had been killed by his brother Seth, recovered and restored by his wife Isis (with
the help of the secret name of Re) and resurrected by his son Horus, who avenged
his father by overcoming Seth in a battle presided by Thoth. When Osiris
migrated up the Nile from the Delta, he was identified with the old mortuary
jackal-god
of the South, "the First of the Westeners" (Abydos, Assiut). His kingdom was
conceived as situated below the western horizon, where it merged into the
netherworld. He became the king of the dead below the Earth, the "Lord of
the Duat", monarch of a subterranean kingdom.

"... in the Solar faith we have a
state theology, with all the splendor and the prestige of its royal patrons
behind it ; while in that of Osiris we are confronted by a religion of the
people, which made a strong appeal to the individual believer. (...) In the
mergence of these two faiths we discern for the first time in history the
age-old struggle between the state form of religion and the popular faith of the
masses." - Breasted,
1972, pp.140-141.
According to
Breasted, nothing in these primordial myths proved Osiris
to have a celestial afterlife.
Indeed, the Pyramid Texts evidence
survivals from a period when Osiris was even hostile to the Solar dead. There
are exorcisms intended to retain Osiris to enter the Solar tomb with evil intent.
However, the popularity of Osiris among the common people forced the theologians
to incorporate him into the Solar creed. In this way, Heliopolitan Solar
theology got slowly Osirianized.

The resurrection of Osiris by Horus and the restoration of his body was affirmed
to be Pharaoh's privilege. The Osirian hereafter was celestialized. Osiris was
now called "Lord of the sky" (PT, §§ 964, 966a) and Pharaoh was announced
to Osiris in the sky precisely in the same way as he had been announced to Re in
the Solar theology. Hence, we find Pharaoh ascending to the sky and then
descending among the dwellers in the netherworld (PT, § 1164),
implying that the Duat became somehow accessible from the sky. In the
Osirian cult, the netherworld became the lower region of the sky, in the
vincinity of the horizon, below which it is also extended (Breasted). An
important link between Re and Osiris was the former's death every day in the
West, the place of the dead. The dead Pharaoh and the dying Sun corresponded
well, as did the resurrection of Osiris (as king of the dead) and the dawning of
the Sun (as the child Harpocrates, who is the father of the king of the living).

"The fact remains, then,
that the celestial doctrines of the hereafter dominate the Pyramid
Texts throughout, and the later subterranean kingdom of Osiris and
Re's voyage through it are still entirely in the background in these royal
mortuary teachings. Among the people Re is later, as it were, dragged
into the Nether World to illumine there the subjects of Osiris in his mortuary
kingdom, and this is one of the most convincing evidences of the power of Osiris
among the lower classes. In the royal and state temple theology,
Osiris is lifted to the sky, and while he is there Solarized, we have just shown
he also tinctures the Solar teaching of the celestial kingdom of the dead with
Osirian doctrines. The result was thus inevitable confusion, as the two faiths
interpenetrated." - Breasted,
1972, pp.159-160.The Pyramid Texts hence evidence the emergence of a
composite mortuary doctrine. But what used to be viewed as a separate "Osirian"
destiny of the king
"has more recently been recognized as one aspect of his
celestial cycle - the regenerative phase through which he passes before 'rising
in the eastern side of sky like the Sun' (Pyr. 1465d-e)." (Allen,
1989, p.1).

1.2
The theo-literary
testament of Unis and its spatiality.

► spatial semantics

In Ancient Egyptian thought, measurements and spatial relationships between
parts of a building were considered significant from a religious and ceremonial point of
view. Spatial semantics played a role in the arrangement of texts on papyri &
stelæ (cf. the Shabaka Stone). Surely identical
considerations animated the architecture of Pharaoh's tomb ?

The texts in the tomb of Unis do not provide us with a straightforward narrative of
their ritual performance. The latter is never decontextualized, but was partly
iconified in architecture and architectural decoration. Both antechamber and
burial-chamber have as central theme the resurrection of the king and his ascent
to heaven. Offering rituals, one of the instruments of resurrection, accompany
the presentation of offerings. But, on the East gable of the burial-chamber, the king establishes his independence of food
supply.

"Exploitation of a narrative coherence in
representation of the ritual falls far behind symbolic and spatial
ordering as a principle of decoration : the ordering of the ritual
material is to a considerable extent defined by general principles of
a largely symbolic nature, modified by the ad hoc resolutions
necessary to fill the space available." -Eyre,
2002, p.44.
This symbolico-magical use betrays the deeper intention of the hieroglyphs : the wise has seen
how the Ka of former Pharaohs had no longer been fed and they introduced
written food offerings and voice-offerings as a magical alternative (Sethe,
1908). The inscriptions served this magical
purpose. To the subtle body of the Ka, the sacred script represented the subtle
energies of what was represented. It "read" the sacred words and was "fed" even
if the priests forgot to perform the offering ritual. If the script contained
images of dangerous animals, the sign was crippled ...

►
reading a tomb
?

For
Sethe (1908), the
texts found in these pyramids were a free collection of magical
utterances, which, by virtue of their presence, assisted Pharaoh de
opere operato in his resurrection & ascension, dispensing with
the need for daily priestly offerings to his Ka. The presence of
texts of offering fed the subtle bodies of the deceased. Sacred words
not only describe objects but embody their double (cf. the Lascaux
pictures and the Eastern desert petroglyphs). Hence, once properly
recited (by the dead), they became efficient (for all of eternity).
These are the deified elements of Egyptian ante-rational epistemology
: "Sia" (understanding), "Hu" (authorative speech) and "Heka"
(efficient power or magic). These natural types of cognition in an
Egyptian mode, form the core of the mental spirituality of the
Egyptians. The hidden, secret, dark potential of hieroglyphs was
evidenced by the sacrificial rituals found in mortuary literature. The
Ba of the deceased read the words and manifested their meaning.

"We have already pointed out that the spells of
the so-called sacrificial ritual, i.e. the texts used in the provision
of supplies, were inscribed in a prominent place where they could be
seen by the dead person resting in his sarcophagus. (...) In other
words, texts were written down so that the dead themselves could
'proclaim the provision of supplies' ("nis dbHt-Htp") instead of this
being done by unreliable priests. This was the nucleus around which
the texts crystallized." - Morenz,
1996, p.229.

Schott(1945) &
Ricke (1950)
advanced the thesis that at the time of the funeral, these texts were
recited in the various chambers, corridors and courts through which
the procession passed on its way to the pyramid. But it was not easy
to identify which spell was recited were ! For
Spiegel (1953 &
1971) the texts were an integral part of the funerary ritual performed
in the tomb and hence were recited in the area were they were
inscribed. They reflected the royal burial ritual. This hypothesis was
criticized. In 1960, Morenz wrote :

"This bold, learned and ingenious interpretation
can properly be accessed only by one who has examined it in terms of
the vast and diverse material. When this is done, it appears that
quite serious objections may be levelled against numerous points in
the argumentation and thus against the thesis as such." - Morenz,
1996, p.228-229.
Nevertheless,
Altenmüller
(1972) agrees with Schott & Ricke that these texts were recited in the
mortuary temple, as well as in the pyramid, involving priests assuming
the god-forms of Re, Horus, Seth and Thoth.
Eyre (2002) suggests the training and
initiation of these priests points to this-life rituals.

"The promise of divine assistance, resurrection, and safe
passage to the afterlife is not, however, a concern purely of funerary ritual,
and the markedly initiatory form of parts of the mortuary literature must be
taken as a pointer to contemporary 'this-life' ritual that is otherwise lost
from the archaeological record." - Eyre,
2002, p.72.
In "Reading a Pyramid",
Allen
(1988) compared the
location of the texts within the
tomb of Unis with
other Old Kingdom pyramids and tombs (cf.
Morenz, 1960). He was able to establish a coherent model
describing the funerary ideology of these royal tombs. The
position of particular groups of texts within Unis' pyramid correspond with the
placement of the same texts in other pyramids. Spells recited during the burial ritual
were
also
eternalized as divine words
on the walls, further complementing
the symbolism of the general layout of the mortuary complex in general and the
royal tomb in particular. Assmann (1983, 1989) notes :

"The Egyptian describes this function of the
spoken word with the causative derivation of the phonetic root (i)Ax,
thus arriving at s-Ax 'to transfigure')." -
Assmann, 1989,
p.137.A combination of all these elements
is likely. The overall Egyptian funerary mentality seems to favour
an enduring canon of broad schemes adaptable to immediate
circumstances. As each Pharaoh had his own titulary, he had his
own burial ritual and mortuary complex, reflecting a variety of local
(nomic) traditions at work around him. They existed by the grace of
the "good Nile" he alone, being divine, could guarantee. His death was
thus a major calamity, and could perturbate the agricultural cycle,
leading to famine, conflicts and death. His burial provided him with a
ladder between heaven and Earth, and so the first thing he would do,
arriving in the Field of Offering, was to provide Egypt with a new
king and a "good Nile".

The reciprocal function of the tomb has to be emphasized. The Ba
returned and the Ka could be reanimated. The liberated "Akh" has
freedom of movement and time. It is bright, light and radiant. While
it stays in the sky, the spirits make their souls and doubles come
down and unite with their statues. The destruction of a tomb, implies
the end of its role as "interphase" with "the other side" of the false
door.

"Allen's analysis of the sequence of spells in the pyramid
of Unis defines the architecture as a material representation of the passage of
the king through death to resurrection, exploiting themes familiar in the
Underworld Books of the New Kingdom. From the darkness of the earth he passes to
life in the light of the sky, progressing from the burial chamber as underworld
(duat) through the antechamber as horizon (akht) where he becomes Akh, through
the doorway leading to the corridor -ascending by ladder- to heaven (pet), or
passing like the setting sun from the west to his rising from the mouth of the
horizon in the east, or exploiting the image of the king passing from his
sarcophagus -the womb of Nut- through her vulva to birth at the door of the
horizon. (...) Allen's analysis focuses on the principle whereby the position of
discrete units of ritual text asserts a functional identity between the theology
of the text and the architectural symbolism of the pyramid substructure, and so
the reality of the king's passage to resurrection". - Eyre,
2002, p.44-45 & 47.
The direction of the texts was thus identical with
the soul's path through the tomb, moving from the innermost parts of the
burial-chamber
(the "Duat" in the West), through the
antechamber
(the Eastern horizon or "Akhet"),
to the outside of the pyramid via the
second northern
tunnel, flying to the Northern stars, reaching the Field of Offering.

the Duat
(burial-chamber) : though a part of the world, but neither Earth or sky,
the underworld is inaccessible to the living and outside normal human
experience. It is separate from the sky and reached prior to it. This Field of
Reeds is the realm of the deceased and the deities and the mystery of Osiris.
Pharaoh has perpetuated offerings, and stands at the door of the horizon to
emerge from the Duat and start his spiritualization ;

the Horizon
(antechamber) : "Axt" ("Akhet"), translated as "horizon", is both the
junction of sky and Earth and a place in the sky underneath this point (before
eastern dawn and after western dusk), a secret interstitial zone reached and
crossed by boat. It is a zone of
transition and a "radiant place", the "land of the blessed".
The horizon is the place of becoming effective, the locus of the becoming "Ax"
("Akh"), an effective spirit. Note (as did
Allen,
1988), that the Cannibal Hymn, thematically belongs
in its place (the East gable). It summarized Pharaoh's passage through the night
sky to the Sun at dawn. The process of spiritualization ends with the emergence
of the new light. In this hymn to Pharaoh, the king prepares the deities for his
meal ;

the
Imperishable Sky (northern tunnels) : the process of transfiguration (ultimate
spiritualization) being completed, the Akh-spirit leaves the tomb and ascends to
the northern stars.

1.3 Power : the medium of the deities and
their authority.

Around the sceptre of authority, three meanings emerged :

the "âba"-sceptre
("abA") refers to authority (cf. the word for "stela")
and resplendence (the word for "shine") ;

"kherep"
("xrp") or "be at the head", "control" ;

the
"sekhem"-sceptre, from "sekhem" ("sxm") or
"have power".

Every distinct & repetitive
fundamental process of nature (a deity) possessed "sekhem" or
"power". A divine being's existence as an operational continuity-in-process
(or soul, the "Ba") revealed its inner identity or name ("ren"). To know this name, was
the only way to secure for oneself the "power" or "magic"
("heka") of the god or goddess at hand. With her powers, Isis made Re
suffer to the point that he revealed his names to her (cf. the Cunning of
Isis). This allowed Isis to
create the "spiritual body" ("sAH"), a noble dignity in
which Osiris could resurrect as "king of the dead".

Name, power, magic and soul were the categories which allowed something or
someone to be defined. Gods and goddesses were called "the great
one", because their power was profound, extended and unique. The distinction
between lesser and higher (provincial versus national) deities paralleled the
spatial distribution of their extraordinary power. Some powers were local,
others superseded the boundaries of the nomes or even the division of Egypt in
Two Lands.

With the advent of the Dynasties, Pharaoh assimilated the powers of the sacred
feminine, which had been of immense importance in the Predynastic age (cf.
Hassan, 1992).
The feminine remained intimately linked with rituals of transition (especially
with those of instoration, either of Pharaoh or a Dynasty), but the
"power" of Pharaoh was beyond dispute. His was a natural, charismatic
authority, which enabled him to unite divisions. At first, this was thought to
derive from the age-old figure of Horus, the sky god "par excellence",
who dwelled in Pharaoh and who was Predynastic of origin. Next, Pharaoh was a
"power" in his own right, a god who was the son of the creator, Re. In
the Cannibal Hymn we hear of Pharaoh Unis as the power of powers,
overpowering the powers ...

2 The
Cannibal Hymn to Pharaoh Unis.

2.1 Cannibalism in Ancient Egypt ?

Siculus Diodorus, born in Agyrium in Sicily in the latter half of the
first century BCE, relates in his history that Osiris forbade the Egyptians to
eat each other. After having learned the arts of agriculture, it would seem that
the habit of killing and eating one another ceased. According to him, the
primitive Egyptians from time to time resorted to cannibalism ...

"There us no
archaeological evidence to confirm traditions of cannibalism in Predynastic
times." -
Trigger, Kemp,
O'Connor
& Lloyd, 1994, p.31.
In tombs of predynastic inhabitants, bodies were found which have been buried
whole. Plutarch and Egyptian inscriptions support the idea that Osiris had been
a great king who was not buried according to the African custom of the period.
His head, flesh, bones, heart and other organs of his body were collected and
rejoined. This reconstituted body was swathed in linen smeared with
sweet-smelling ungruents and sprinkled with preservative spices.

"It is clear from the
frequency of the repetition of these statements, that, before his time, it was
not customary to treat the bodies of the dead in this fashion, and that the
rejoining of the limbs of the dead before burial was unusual." -
Budge, 1973, volume I, p.168.
Although there is no evidence to be obtained from the remains of Predynastic
graves to support the case of cannibalism as a tradition, it is likely the
Egyptians and their ancestors at some time or other in their prehistory indulged in
it. If Osiris stopped the practice of Egyptians eating Egyptians, it is very
likely they continued to sacrifice those conquered in battle (strangers and
foreigners), and even, when famine reigned, returned to cannibalism, which was
widespread among African tribes. In common practice with many African tribes,
their customs in dealing with vanquished enemies, foreigners & strangers
were indeed savage and intended to terrify them.

Although in the Cannibal Hymn, the practice is used metaphorically, its
description fits the actual activity rather well. As we
know a lot of Predynastic and Early Dynastic elements were incorporated in
the Pyramid Texts, it is not unlikely our hymn refers to this
loathsome practice.

Although archaeological evidence shows that in Predynastic
& Dynastic times, cannibalism never became a traditional practice, the
danger of its return was always lurking (and did reemerge during periods of
national catastrophes like famine - cf. at the end of the Old Kingdom and
even in our times, namely among the Russians in Nazi prisoncamps).

"In the Terrible Famine
("al-Shiddat ull-Uzmma", literally "The Greatest Crisis") of
AH 447 (AD 1059), which lasted unbroken for seven years, horses, asses, dogs,
and cats were consumed before people at last began to eat each other. Passer-by
were caught in the streets by hooks let down from windows, drawn up, killed, and
cooked. Human flesh was sold in public." - Hassan, 1993, p.164.
It
is interesting to note that Osirian faith rejected cannibalism (although human sacrifice was
regarded as a symbol of the "great sacrifice" of Osiris and a successful effort to
avenge his death). In the Cannibal
Hymn, Osiris as such is not mentioned.

If we speculate that during the funerary rituals in the tomb, the mummy, before
being slid through the narrow Western passage-way between antechamber and
burial-chamber to enter the latter, was positioned in the middle of the
antechamber facing the East (had the mummy entered the antechamber facing North
and turned with its head West ?), then we may start to understand the
ceremonial hermeneutics at hand and add them to the other layers under
investigation.

The Cannibal Hymn initiates the confrontation of Pharaoh
(c.q. the mummy) with the Eastern gods of the Ka-chapel. It ends with all gods
being gulped down by Pharaoh ! The antechamber is the place of the
transformation of the soul into a spirit, and the hymn underlines this.
Although, on first reading, it seems to lie outside the progression, it details
Pharaoh's passage through the night sky to ultimate resurrection with the Sun at
dawn.

2.2 A philological remark :

In the tomb of Pharaoh Unis, the Cannibal Hymn was inscribed on the East
wall of the antechamber which separates the antechamber from the Ka-chapel
(which is devoid of inscriptions). Its position there is significant : Pharaoh
is stronger than the divine pantheon. The divinities are eaten up by Pharaoh and
thus the "power of powers" is able to rise.

The Cannibal Hymn covers
Utterances 273 & 274 (Sethe, §§ 393 - 414 or Unis 496 - 525). Evidence
teaches these
two sayings form a literary whole. In the tomb of Teti, the Cannibal
Hymn was also inscribed on the East wall of the antechamber. Although the
variant spelling of the Teti-text is taken into account, only the
hieroglyphs of
Unas are given. They have been digitally enhanced using the standard notation of
Sethe.

Utterance
273

The sky rains down.
The stars darken.
The celestial vaults stagger.
The bones of Aker(1)
tremble.
The decans are stilled against them,
at seeing Pharaoh rise as a Ba
(2).
A god who lives on his fathers and feeds on his mothers.

Pharaoh is Lord of Wisdom whose mother knows not his name.
Pharaoh's glory is in the sky, his might is in the horizon.
Like his father, Atum, his begetter.
Though his son, Pharaoh is mightier than he.

Pharaoh's Kas are behind him.
His guardian forces
(3)
are under his feet.
His gods are over him.
His Uraeus-serpents are on his brow.
Pharaoh's guiding-serpent is on his forehead :
she who sees the Ba (of the enemy as) good for burning.
Pharaoh's neck is on his trunk.

Pharaoh is the Bull of the Sky,
who shatters at will,
who lives on the being of every god,
who eats their entrails,
even of those who come with their bodies
full of magic from the Island of Flame (4).

Pharaoh is one equipped,
who assembles his Akhs.
Pharaoh appears as this Great One,
Lord of those with (helping) hands.
He sits with his back to Geb,
for it is Pharaoh who weighs what he says,
together with Him-whose-name-is-hidden (5),
on this day of slaying the oldest ones.

Pharaoh is Lord of Offerings, who knots the cord,
and who himself prepares his meal.
Pharaoh is he who eats men and lives on gods,
Lord of Porters, who dispatches written messages.

It is 'Grasper-of-the-top-knot', who is Kehau, who lassoes them for
Pharaoh.
It is 'Serpent Raised-head' who guards them for him and restrains them for him.
It is 'He-upon-the-willows' who binds them for him.
It is Courser, slayer
of Lords, who will cut their throats for Pharaoh,
and will extract for him what is in their bodies,
for he is the messenger whom Pharaoh sends to restrain.
It is Shezmu
(6)who
will cut them up for Pharaoh,
and cooks meals of them in his dinner-pots.

Utterance 274
It is Pharaoh who eats their magic and gulps down their Akhs.
Their big ones are for his morning meal,
their middle-sized ones are for his evening meal,
their little ones are for his night meal,
their old men and their old women are for his incense-burning.
It is the Great Ones in the North of the sky
(7)
who light the fire for him
to the cauldrons containing them,
with the thighs of their eldest (as fuel).

Those who are in the sky serve Pharaoh,
And the butcher's blocks are wiped over for him,
with the feet of their women.

He has revolved around the whole of the two skies.
He has circled the two banks
(8).
For Pharaoh is the great power that overpowers the powers.
Pharaoh is a sacred image,
the most sacred image
of the sacred images of the Great One.
Whom he finds in his way,
him he devours bit by bit (9).

Pharaoh's place is at the head
of all the noble ones (10)
who are in the horizon.
For Pharaoh is a god, older than the oldest.
Thousands revolve around him, hundreds offer to him.
There is given to him a warrant as a great power by
Orion (11),
the father of the gods.

Pharaoh has risen again in the sky.
He is crowned as Lord of the Horizon.
He has smashed the back-bones,
and has seized the hearts of the gods.
He has eaten the Red Crown (12).
He has swallowed the Green One(13).
Pharaoh feeds on the lungs of the wise.
And likes to live on hearts and their magic.

Pharaoh abhors against licking the coils of the Red Crown.
But delights to have their magic in his belly.
Pharaoh's dignities will not be taken away from him.
For he has swallowed the knowledge of every god.
Pharaoh's lifetime is eternal repetition.
His limit is everlastingness.
In this his dignity of :
'If-he-likes-he-does.
If-he-dislikes-he-does-not.'
He who is at the limits of the horizon,
for ever and ever.

Lo, their Ba is in Pharaoh's belly.
Their Akhs are in Pharaoh's possession,
as the surplus of his meal out of the gods.
Which is cooked for Pharaoh from their bones.

Lo, their Ba is in Pharaoh's possession.
Their shadows are removed from their owners,
while Pharaoh is this one who ever rises and lasting lasts.

The doers of ill deeds have no power to destroy,
the chosen seat of Pharaoh,
among the living in this land.
For ever and
ever.

Notes :

(01)
AKER :
is an Earth-god who presides over the juncture of the horizons. The socket
holding the mast of the ferryboat is identified with Aker, who's motif consists
of the foreparts of two lions, or two human heads, juxtaposed so that they face
away from each other. Aker opens the gate of the Earth for Pharaoh to pass into
the netherworld. He stands for the idea of enclosure. As a plural, Akeru, are
the Earth-gods to be avoided. There is a general hope for everyone to escape the
grasp of these gods. He had to be appeased. The horizon (Akhet) is the place of
transformation of the soul (Ba) into a spirit (Akh). The antechamber of the tomb
is were this transformation was enacted (during the funerary rituals and by the
deceased in his or her noble body, the sah) and recorded (on the walls).(02) BA (soul), KA (double), AB (heart),
AKH (spirit) :
subtle parts of the human constitution (cf. Discourse
of a Man with his Ba and
Amduat).(03) HEMUSET : the feminine
counterpart of the Ka, guardian forces.(04) ISLAND OF FLAME : Isle of
Fire or "iw-n-sisi", a region in the kingdom of Osiris where the beatified dead
obtained their food, and linked with the regeneration of Re & Pharaoh in the
Solar Boat travelling through the hours of the Duat, the Netherworld (cf.
Amduat). Non-royals hoped a place in the kingdom of Osiris, in
his "Field of Reeds".(05) HIM-WHOSE-NAME-IS-HIDDEN :
"imn-rn.f" : "he who's name is hidden", an epithet of Amun.(06) KEHAU - HE-UPON-THE-WILLOWS - KHONSU
- SHEZMU : the first two gods catch and bind Pharaoh's victims with
willow branches. Khonsu, or "wanderer" was a Moon-god prominent at Thebes. In
the New Kingdom his role changed. No longer a bloodthirsty god, he is regarded
as the child of Amun and Mut. Shezmu is a bloodthirsty god of wine and
ungruent-oil presses. Here he acts as butcher who cuts the deities up and cooks
them. At the time of the construction of the Step Pyramid (ca. 2654 - 2635 BCE), Shezmu
had already a priesthood.(07) THE GREAT ONE IN THE NORTH OF THE
SKY : the circumpolar stars which are the terminus of Pharaoh's
ascension, especially the Pole Star (Alpha Draconis). This "Field of
Offering" is the home of Re, the Ennead and Pharaoh.(08) THE TWO BANKS : the two sides
of the Nile, i.e. Egypt.(09) The crucial passage of the Cannibal Hymn.
Pharaoh is the ultimate power & image.(10) NOBLE ONES : or Sahu ("sAHw")
: the noble dead or spiritual bodies of the souls (cf. Discourse of a Man with his Ba). (11) ORION : at culmination, once every 24 hours,
the three stars in Orion's belt passed above the southern
ventilation shaft in the burial-chamber of the Great Pyramid of Khufu. Orion (or
Osiris)
traversed the sky with Sirius (or Isis). Sothis or Sirius (the Dog-star),
heralded the annual inundation of the Nile by its appearance at dawn in July (cf. its
"heliacal rising"). The Greek "Sothis" is derived from the Egyptian "sepdet". As
the agricultural calendar began with the rise of the Nile, she is also called
"bringer of the New Year". Sothis gave birth to the morning star and was the
guide of Pharaoh in the celestial realms. Hence, besides the Northern
imperishable circumpolar stars, Southern Orion (Osiris) and Sothis (Sirius -
Isis) were the two most important stars in the firmament.(12) RED CROWN : refers to the
sovereignty of Lower Egypt, the Delta, the North.(13) THE GREEN ONE : for Faulkner
it is a reference to the conquest of Lower Egypt and to Wadjet (cf. Lichtheim),
the tutelary serpent-goddess of the North. For Sethe it is the name of a crown.

The Cannibal
Hymn to Pharaoh(ca.2350 BCE)

The form of this hymn is fivefold :

INTRODUCTION :
Pharaoh's arrival in heaven is described in vivid colours. The
heavens tremble when this extraordinary being rises. He is a divine
soul, an extraordinary power who lives on his ancestors. Firm,
crowned and with his gods over him, he burns his enemies, seeks his
glory and claims his superiority over Atum-Re, his father and the
creative principle of creation.

PREPARING THE DIVINE MEAL
: Pharaoh is the Bull of the sky who does what he wills. Although it
is explicitly stated Pharaoh lives on the (coming into) being of
every god, a series of deities escaped his dinner-pots. Geb, Amun
and those who were about him (mentioned in the INTRODUCTION) and
those who prepared the divine meal were probably exempt, although
this is not explicitly stated, on the contrary.

THE
DIVINE MEAL : The
cannibal scene is a metaphor for what happens to Pharaoh when
entering heaven in the afterlife, namely, the realization of his own
principle qua principle : subjugating all other principle to the
sole principle of his incarnated divinity : the continuity &
tenacity of what he wills, namely pharaonic unification & order.

AFTER
THE MEAL : This
section contains the actual hymn to Pharaoh. Clearly after his
divine meal Pharaoh is more powerful than before and his true
essence is revealed. He has become a "great power", overpowering the
powers. The figure or image of his divine status as a "great one" is
exhalted to its optimum optimorum : Pharaoh is the
image of images. He has entered eternal repetition and everlastingness and
finally seized the ultimate power encircled by all possibe horizons.

CONFIRMATION : By
this divine act of eating his own divine kind, Pharaoh added to his
divinity. He gained a divine surplus. Because of their power in him
he eternally rises and lasts for ever. Henceforward, Pharaoh reigns
the heavens as well as his chosen seat on Earth.

INTRODUCTION
The sky
rains down.
The stars darken.
The celestial vaults stagger.
The bones of Aker tremble.
The decans are stilled against them,
at seeing King Unis rise as a Ba.
A god who lives on his fathers
and feeds on his mothers.

Pharaoh is Lord of Wisdom
whose mother knows not his name.
Pharaoh's glory is in the sky,
his might is in the horizon.
Like his father, Atum, his begetter.
Though his son, Pharaoh is mightier than he.

Pharaoh's Kas are behind him.
His guardian forces are under his feet.
His gods are over him.
His Uraeus-serpents are on his brow.
Pharaoh's guiding-serpent is on his forehead :
she who sees the Ba
(of the enemy as) good for burning.
Pharaoh's neck is on his trunk.

PREPARING THE DIVINE MEAL

Pharaoh is the Bull of the Sky,
who shatters at will,
who lives on the being of every god,
who eats their entrails,
even of those who come with their bodies
full of magic from the Island of Fire.

Pharaoh is one equipped,
who assembles his Akhs.
Pharaoh appears as this Great One,
Lord of those with (helping) hands.
He sits with his back to Geb,
for it is Pharaoh who weighs what he says,
together with Him-whose-name-is-hidden,
on this day of slaying the oldest ones.

Pharaoh is Lord of Offerings,
who knots the cord,
and who himself prepares his meal.
Pharaoh is he who eats men and lives on gods,
Lord of Porters,
who dispatches written messages.

It is 'Grasper-of-the-top-knot', who is Kehau,who lassoes them for Pharaoh.
It is 'Serpent Raised-head'
who guards them for him
and restrains them for him.
It is 'He-upon-the-willows'
who binds them for him.
It is Courser, slayer of Lords,
who will cut their throats for Pharaoh,
and will extract for him what is in their bodies,
for he is the messenger,
whom Pharaoh sends to restrain.
It is Shezmuwho will cut them up for Pharaoh,
and cooks meals of them in his dinner-pots.

THE DIVINE MEAL

It is Pharaoh who eats their magic
and gulps down their Akhs.
Their big ones are for his morning meal,
their middle-sized ones are for his evening meal,
their little ones are for his night meal,
their old men and their old women
are for his incense-burning.
It is the Great Ones
in the North of the sky,
who light the fire for him
to the cauldrons containing them,
with the thighs of their eldest (as fuel).

Those who are in the sky serve Pharaoh,
and the butcher's blocks are wiped over for him,
with the feet of their women.

AFTER THE MEAL
Hymn to Pharaoh

He has revolved around
the whole of the two skies.
He has circled the two banks.
For Pharaoh is the great power
that overpowers the powers.
Pharaoh is a sacred image,
the most sacred image
of the sacred images of the Great One.
Whom he finds in his way,
him he devours bit by bit.

Pharaoh's place is at the head
of all the noble ones who are in the horizon.
For Pharaoh is a god, older than the oldest.
Thousands revolve around him,
hundreds offer to him.
There is given to him a warrant
as a great power by Orion,
the father of the gods.

Pharaoh has risen again in the sky.
He is crowned as Lord of the Horizon.
He has smashed the back-bones,
and has seized the hearts of the gods.
He has eaten the Red Crown.
He has swallowed the Green One.
Pharaoh feeds on the lungs of the wise.
And likes to live on hearts and their magic.
Pharaoh abhors against licking
the coils of the Red Crown.
But delights to have their magic in his belly.

Pharaoh's dignities
will not be taken away from him.
For he has swallowed
the knowledge of every god.
Pharaoh's lifetime is eternal repetition.
His limit is everlastingness.
In this his dignity of :
'If-he-likes-he-does.
If-he-dislikes-he-does-not.'
He who is at the limits of the horizon,
for ever and ever.

CONFIRMATION

Lo, their Ba is in Pharaoh's belly.
Their Akhs are in Pharaoh's possession,
as the surplus of his meal out of the gods.
Which is cooked for Pharaoh from their bones.

Lo, their Ba is in Pharaoh's possession.
Their shadows are removed from their owners,
while Pharaoh is this one
who ever rises and lasting lasts.

The doers of ill deeds
have no power to destroy,
the chosen seat of Pharaoh,
among the living in this land.
For ever and ever.

3 Philosophical
Remarks ...

In this exceptional hymn to Pharaoh, written more than 4000 years ago, we
encounter a pre-rational discourse on an Egyptian phenomenology of the divine.
As this communication is
ante-rational (i.e. does not make use of context-independent abstractions but of
authorative speech) and is
described in verbal, poetical terms only, the first letter of words
like "divine", "god", "gods", "goddesses" & "pantheon" are not capitalized.

Nevertheless, the extreme, radical and comprehensive features of the
pre-rational process at
hand remain unmistaken, and point to a highly evolved position taken regarding
the fundamental dialectical tension between a finite being (part of creation)
and the infinite (or unconditional) which it does not fail to eventually meet.
The fact that we have to accept the Ancient Egyptian pre-rational paradigm of
existence as given, does not reduce the actuality of the vision of Unis. For when the process is applied to contemporary axioms regarding the cosmos and the
place of humanity therein, we are baffled by the seemingly
Nietzschean boldness of the choices proposed by Unis and Teti (who also added
this hymn to his literary testament). And so, although the overall complexity of
the Pyramid Texts evidence a pre-rational cognitive texture, the
literary qualities of the Cannibal Hymn excell and touch the
proto-rational mode of cognition, although still heavely overlayed with metaphor
and allegory (close to direct enactment of the original, founding myths).

"To appreciate the true
intellectual content of ancient thought, we have to look behind the images for
the concepts those images are meant to convey." -
Allen, 1988,
p.ix.3.1 Pharaoh as a god.

In this discourse, the notions "god" and "goddess"
function as indicators of the principles of nature, its differentials as grasped
by the ante-rational mind. So the fact that Pharaoh
Unis is also a human, points to the concept (albeit concrete, practical, local
and contextual) of the "perfect(ed)" human being. This is the
prototype of humanity inscribed in the various processes of nature, which exist in
and through a continuous living interaction with life in all its modes and
variations. In Ancient Egypt, this prototype
incarnated as the male person of Pharaoh and the concrete but sacred history of his
development.

"Thus, we might characterize the ancient Egyptian sense of history with the
phrase 'history as celebration'. The description has provoked some controversy,
since, as a shorthand expression, it cannot do justice to all aspects of the
Egyptian view. Of concern here, however, is the basic tone sounded again and
again in ancient Egypt, the ceremonial character of history, which exists in
many other cultures as well, even to the present day." - Hornung,
1992, p.157.
The so-called "own-form" of Pharaoh was the
leading concept in Ancient Egypt's view on the place of humanity in the order of
creation. This concrete form may be read as a proto-rational, iconical prefiguration of later abstract
ideas, such as the Messiah of Judaism, the "mystical
body" of Jesus Christ (the "son of God"), the
Judeo-Christo-Islamic notion of prophetic lineage, or the ideal of the "perfect
man" in
Sufism and Taoism.

"I sit before him, I
open his boxes, I break open his edicts, I seal his dispatches, I send out his
messengers, who do not grow weary, and I do what he says to me." -
Pyramid Texts, Utterance
309 : W 600 - 602 / §§ 490 - 491.
Pharaoh Unis serves as secretary to his father, Atum-Re. In this role he is as Thoth, the divine word, for he sits before Re,
prepares his boxes, dispatches his messages, etc. In all other Unis Texts, the same message is repeated : Pharaoh Unis is a god who
controls the other deities and who is feared by the latter. The Cannibal
Hymn makes vividly clear why : Pharaoh Unis is a cannibalistic god !

The Pharaonic form is the over-arching, proto-rational concept of Ancient Egyptian
religion (the foundation of Egyptian civilization). It was formed in several steps.
The Egyptian
way initiated
the ante-rational study of nature and her multiple processes. These operate in contrary
directions and
always exist on the brink of oblivion, fighting the return of chaos
("Nun"), conceived as the absence of existence, division and
movement, and rejecting evil ("isefet"). Nature is not composed of things, but of beings ... The Egyptian deities
personified the result of this proto-rational
study of nature (first giving rise to provincial deities, a few
"national" ones and finally a hidden god, one and millions - cf.
Aten
& Amun) and explained the way these various aspects of the
natural order ("Maat" or "mAat") co-existed and were maintained for "ten
million, hundred thousand millions of years". Through the person of
Pharaoh, the human order was conceived as an integral part of the natural one.
However, these speculations remained versed in practical, proto-rational thought.
Pharaoh maintained the world and ruled the waters.

"And none of the
Egyptian sources is the record of scientific or philosophical speculation for
its own sake. All serve some practical end, whether the worship of god or
the attempt to secure a successful afterlife for the dead. Yet there is at the
base a fundamental sameness between the Egyptian record and our own more
familiar tradition. Like later philosophers and scientists, the Egyptian
thinkers must have speculated, discussed, and passed on their concepts to
subsequent generations." - Allen,
1988, p.56, my
italics.
In Egypt, everything depended on the harmonization of all natural (read :
divine) powers. In the Old Kingdom, this "human order" revolved
around Pharaoh, the apex of civilization. Only from the Middle Kingdom onward,
could (wealthy) Egyptians place "Osiris" before their names ...
However, this
did not hinder the return of a deified Pharaoh in the New Kingdom (Amenhotep III
and IV -Akhenaten-, Ramesses II).

The expression :
"Unas pa neter" ("wnis-pi-nTr") : "Unis is god",
underlines Pharaoh was more than just one of the divine beings possessing divine power
("sekhem"). On top of being very powerful, like Horus
and the deities (who dwell in and around Pharaoh as they do in their
statues), the latter was conceived as a precosmic being, one of the
preexistent and fundamental elements and forces of nature, i.e. a precreational god
in his own right. Pharaoh
was worshipped as an incarnation of Re ("hem-en-neter" or "Hm-n-Ntr"),
the principle of creation : light.

The move from Horus the Old (Early Dynastic)
and Horus, son of Osiris (from IVth Dynasty onwards), was seamless, as if the
Ancient Egyptians themselves were not aware of the fundamental distinction
between Pharaoh as one possessed with divine power versus Pharaoh as god (namely
the son of the principle of creation, Re). Indeed, in the mythical and
pre-rational mind, "very powerful" and the principle of power itself
are not distinguished (which makes, in the context of the Cannibal Hymn, expressions as "power of powers" and "image of images" so
extremely interesting in the context of the cognitive transcendence achieved by
the proto-concept in the proto-rational mode of cognition).

Like
the Egyptian gods and goddesses, who were the elements and forces
"immanent" in the phenomena of nature, Pharaoh was a divine being, who
-by offering justice and truth to his father Re- guaranteed the order of
existence in general and the unity of the Two Lands in particular. He
represented the institutionalized principle which guaranteed the completion and continuity of existence. Unlike
the deities, Pharaoh existed in a mortal living body, which had caught his constituting
elements in its net. So Pharaoh was a living paradox. As long as he
was in a physical body, Pharaoh's soul ("Ba") and spirit
("Ahk") were imprisoned. When it died, these higher foci of
consciousness escaped and could only return in an august, noble and enduring
"spiritual body" (or "sAH"), created as a result of the funerary
rituals. Unlike the deities constituting the natural order and gathered by Maat,
Pharaoh is linked with precreation, and the first time of creation (cf.
Heliopolitan theology).

HIGHEST
SUBTLEST
ETERNAL
realm of the deities

akh
(spirit)

the essence is
luminous, divine and abides in the soul-body as it pleases

khab
(spirit-body)

the light of the
stars is perpetual and house of the essence of Pharaoh

HIGHER
SUBTLE
TRANSITIONAL
realm of the beatified souls

ba
(soul)

witness
at judgement, beatified by Osiris, freely existing in its own body
gratified by the offerings to the ka

sah
(soul-body)

liberated
as the result of mummification and
funerary rituals

LOWER
GROSS
TEMPORAL
the magical cycles of the netherworld and the unity of the Two Lands

ib
(heart or ego)

restored
and weighed - only the truth is light enough to balance the feather

ka
(vitality - ego-body)

free
to move the double remains near the mummy fed by offerings

khat
(corpse)

the
mummy does not decay - mummy and tomb are a symbolization
of eternal existence

As early as the Middle Kingdom,
non-royals could assume the form of Osiris, and a fundamental prerogative of
Pharaoh was made available to the nomarchs (the rulers of the 42 provinces or
nomes), their families and wealthy administrators. For by placing
"Osiris" before their names, the deceased expressed the hope of their
forthcoming deification in the afterlife in the kingdom of Osiris (cf. Coffin
Texts).

In the Old Kingdom, Pharaoh had been the sole monarch of the living and
the pyramideon of civilization. He alone was the guardian of national stability
(centered around Memphis). His spiritual development had been the only one
available, namely that of "the best of the best", c.q. the son of Re
of Heliopolis who daily offered truth & righteousness to make creation
endure. With the collapse of the Old Kingdom, and the decline of the
centralizing Pharaonic ideal, the
popular Osiris became the "king of the dead" and also, for the common
Egyptian (cf. Papyrus of Ani), a path to emancipation in the afterlife
(the "justified" deceased was transformed into a deity, a glorious
dead in the realm of Osiris). Pharaoh remained
an exclusive being (headed to the sky of Re). But every justified Egyptian could subsist in the
afterlife, as a citizen of the netherworld of Osiris. In this way, the afterlife
"in the sky" was envisioned as a simile of the best of our present life
"on Earth" ...

This "democratization" (Wilson) or "demotization" (Assmann) of deification, puts
Ancient Egyptian henotheism (Müller) into evidence. A multitude of gods and goddesses exist.
Nature is conceived as the ordered, organized totality of these beings,
interacting as do members of a family or company of kindred spirits. Practical speculations
allow us to isolated
local deities (at the base of the pyramid), i.e. those
attributed to the nomes, and (in the middle section) national divinities like
Ptah, Thoth, Osiris or Re, with
Pharaoh crowning the whole at the top. Pharaoh and the national deities acted as "principles",
delegating "power" to the more local, provincial expression of natural
(c.q. divine) order. In the Old Kingdom, the region around Memphis was the royal
residence, and hence the focal point of Egyptian civilization. At that time, four major
national cults
prevailed : Atum-Re of Heliopolis, Ptah of Memphis (in Lower Egypt), Thoth of
Hermopolis (Middle Egypt) and Osiris (attested in both Lower -Bubastis- and
Upper Egypt -Abydos-).

In Ptah, we recognize the principle of
materiality, the solidification of the imaginal intent. In Thoth, the verbal
principle and the power of the spoken & written word, the practical
organisation of thought. In Atum-Re, the creative principle itself, the
life-giving activity of light, self-generation, consciousness and the Solar cycle of birth,
culmination, death (dusk) and resurrection (night). In Osiris NN, the spiritual
itinerary of every Egyptian. Just as Pharaoh ruled life, so was Osiris the principle of
continuity (tenacity), but
then in the afterlife. His greatest spiritual realization, helped by his wife &
sister Isis, was the magic of resurrection in the "sah", the body of
resurrection which granted Osiris eternal life
(in the netherworld). Because of this defeat of death, he was seen as the most
trustworthy deity of the afterlife (for only the king was by nature divine and
so headed towards the imperishables). Because his murder was avenged by his son Horus,
who took over the throne of Egypt usurped by Seth, he was the ancestor of every Pharaoh. And as his
kingdom was one of plenty, dance and happiness, no Egyptain could refuse ...

So regarding the horizon of contact with the divine, at least four elements
seem valid :

cultic
: the actual religious actions, expressions and manifestations
of religiosity (in the temples of the nomes, in state cults and in private homes), intimately
connected with the economical, social & political
conditions at hand = "BODY" - material principle ;

nomic
: what is said about the
divine, its laws = "WORD" - verbal principle ;

cosmic/social :
the field of action of the divine = "CREATION" - creative principle ;

Pharaoh brought these four points
of contact together. He was therefore the great witness, the observer of nature
from outside nature. All ritual action was performed by Pharaoh himself or in
his name. All offerings were done by him or in his name. He was the high priest who delegated "power". In the Old Kingdom (and also thereafter), Pharoah was a
paradoxical figure, for he was a "god on Earth", an "Akh"
effectively at work in the lowest plane of existence (the deities never sent
their spirits, but only their souls and doubles). The other
gods & goddesses abided in the other world, and were present in their temples
and images in a symbolical, intermediate fashion only. Ritual offerings and
voice-offerings (prayers) were necessary to keep the Ka or "double"
(psychomotoric charge of etheric, vital matter) present in the statue (cf. the
Ritual of Opening the Mouth) and to gratify the Ba or "soul" of the
deity at hand. Because religious activity only happened between deities (the temples
did
not mediate but were places of divine indwelling) Pharaoh was the sole
cultic mediator, who spoke the "great speech". The overt declaration of the mystical approach of the
divine was the exclusive prerogative of Pharaoh or as the Pyramid
Texts claim :

"Men hide,
the gods fly away."Pyramid Texts, utterance 302 (§
459).
Moreover, as Pharaoh was the apex or "pyramideon" of the pyramidal
structure of the state, and because of his presence, order prevailed and the
unity of the Two Lands was assured. As the unique son of the principle of life,
his offerings returned to his father Re what the latter had given to Egypt by
creating the world. Pharaoh offered truth or "Maat" (the
voice-offering of the great speech) to the source of truth (Re), and by doing so
banned chaos "isefet" to the deep darkness of the primordial ocean
(cf. the cultless Nun or "nwwn").

So regarding Pharaoh, this proto-rational structure emerged :

manifestation
of Horus : Pharaoh is an exceptional witnessing power, as his
"serekh" (or "proclaimer") is constantly overshadowed by the divine
power of Horus, who is above all and oversees all (as the great eye) ;

incarnation of the divine :
Pharaoh is a god, a divine principle incarnate, a principle of
transcendence, the uniter of the Two Lands
and apex of an absolute, ceremonial theocracy ;

son of
Re : Pharaoh
is the "son of Re", the preexistent creative principle of eternal
repetition ("neheh"), and hence participator
in his father's work ;

Osiris
Pharaoh :
Pharaoh, before taking off to the sky, resurrects as did Osiris ;

Horus, son of
Osiris : the throne of
Horus is the
throne of Pharaoh, which justifies Pharaoh.

By deifying Pharaoh, the Ancient
Egyptians incorporated the proto-concept of the ideal human factor in the natural, divine order of beings.
At first, only one, exceptional person could attain such an integration, c.q.
the "great house" of Pharaoh. He was the only "god on
earth", far removed from the common humanity of the people. This integration was thus elitist and dictatorial. The exceptional human lost his
humanity precisely because of this exceptionality. Finally, every deceased was
called "Osiris NN", and deification became the trade of priesthood.
Pharaoh remained the only god alife on Earth. He was of Re, whereas we are of
Osiris.

The gods and goddesses may be compared with self-realized beings, who never slip
out of themselves, but who remained firmly rooted in the principle which they
represent. Their form or model was "natural". Its elements always
belonged to the processes of mineral, vegetal, animal and astral life (the cycles
of Sun and Moon being fundamental here). These beings moved and changed
permanently (as do the planets) but nevertheless remained loyal to their fundamental motoric
etinerary (they rise, culminate, set and resurrect). Substantiality (albeit not
abstract) is indicated : the gods and goddesses remained the same throughout the
change and their experiences taught them how to realize this objective with
increasing practical efficiency. The family relationships between them are ruled
by Maat, truth and justice. She came into being when the cosmos was created, and
does not belong to precreation. The order of the natural universe belongs to the
universe. It does not transcend it. This makes Maat immanent in all things and
thus most likely to be offered by the sole god in creation (Pharaoh) to his own
father (Atum-Re).

As differential and dynamical principles of existence (part of creation), they can also be compared with concrete concepts or stable mental
symbolizations of specific natural processes, observed over a very long period
of time :

the
creative principle : the world was created by light, a metaphor of
conscious awareness ;

the
verbal principle : through speech, all things emerged out of the
primordial chaos ;

the
tenacity (or continuity) principle : all things are sustained thanks
to the ritual activity of Pharaoh and his representatives ;

the
material (or magical) principle : all creative intent solidifies,
gains a concrete material shape and is inherently protected against
corruption, inertia and counter-forces. Being an architecture, the universe
makes sense.

3.2 Slayer
and eater of the gods : divine cannibalism.

In more than one passage, we read how Pharaoh Unis controls the gods &
goddesses of the pantheon. They are fearful when they see Pharaoh rise towards
the sky ...

The Cannibal Hymn commences with the description of what happens when
Pharaoh appears as a powerful Ba : sky and the earth tremble and quiver !
Pharaoh's soul is indeed extraordinary. It is the soul of a god who lives and
feeds on those who gave birth to him without knowing his name (i.e. his true,
preexistent spiritual identity). His glory is in the sky and his power is on Earth. It
extends in all directions. On his head, Pharaoh wears his crown with its deadly
serpent, and under his feet are his Kas and servants. Although son of Atum,
Pharaoh is mightier than the creative principle itself ! Indeed, if he is part
of the precreational order, then he is the only Akh who incarnates on Earth ... Pharaoh was a principle
in his own right, and represents the tenacity & continuity of the Dynastic
or Royal Oath. Moreover, he knows how to synthesize all principles. His
"cartouche" is a royal, Solar circuit or Sed-run. He incarnates the Dual Kingdom
by assimilating all its parts in a symbolized, ritual fashion. He is the only
Akh on Earth and the only Akh in the sky that has been on Earth. Pharaoh is
hence the best of mediators, the image of images.

The god Unis lives on the being of every deity and eats their magic. He is the
"Bull of the sky" who exercises the rights of the victorious tribal chief in
heaven. We learn that Pharaoh has many spirits, not just one. He assembles them
and appears as great and one. The oldest gods are slain. Others are lassoed,
restrained, bound, killed and prepared for Pharaoh's evening pots (lit by the
circumpolar stars and fueled by the thighs of the oldest gods) ! He eats them,
i.e. gulps down their magic and spirits ...
"Pharaohs, O'Connor suggests, also apparently shared in the possession of
negative and highly dangerous powers that could be put to 'good use' in
maintaining order and protecting social order from intrusive chaotic forces
which threaten that order and well-being at every level, from the individual
through the state to the cosmos. It is Pharaoh also that authorizes executions
and, like a Bamileke chief, mediates between principles of violence and
legitimacy and who therefore is a figure of avoidance as well as ambivalence.
Such features may characterize sacred kingship more widely than Egypt, but the
focus is very distinctively on the king's body as autochthonous container and a
conduit for the dispersal of substances." - Rowlands, in : O'Connor
& Reid, 2003, p.53.

This insistence on the age of the slain deities affirms Pharaoh assimilated
his ancestors and thus historical time. He has entered cyclic eternity, the
eternal repetition of the creational cycle within the vastness of
everlastingness (Atum, floating in Nun, hatching, in the first time, out of the
primordial egg). He is even mightier than Atum-Re, his own father and creator
god, for he has been on Earth. The only time when Pharaoh's great speech is weighed in company with
another deity is when Amun is mentioned by his epithet :
"imen-renef", "him whose name is hidden" (§ 399a). This is
remarkable, given that only in the Middle Kingdom, Amun will become "the king of
the gods". Remoteness as the essence of the divine is hence testified ca.2.300
BCE.

The cannibal scene
is a strong poetical image of Pharaonic syncretism, or the assimilation of
divine principles (concepts) by Pharaoh. Indeed, the slain gods are fused
together by the heat of the fire of his melting-pot and reborn in Pharaoh. He
lives on this very process, and thanks to Pharaoh, these diverse deities are
his own and allowed to act under tenacious royal unity. We
may read Pharaoh as the driving force behind the unifying force of mediation and
channeling (between
terrestial and celestial), expressed (in the context of his visit to the sky) as
a tendency to limit the number of deities to a few major ones. Moreover, Pharaoh
stood at the beginning of creation, and oversaw the whole of the divine field :
he was a god, older than the oldest. The henotheist condition of one
supreme deity is hence in place.

3.3
Pharaoh Unis as
"power of powers" & "image of images".

After Pharaoh ate the deities, our hymn enters its exhalting stage.
Pharaoh Unis is more than a god, for he overpowers the deities and his
figure is the ultimate locus of divine manifestation :

"Unis pa sekhem
ur sekhem em sekhemu.
Unis pa âshem âshem âshemu ur."
"For Pharaoh is the great power
that overpowers the powers.
Pharaoh is a sacred image,
the most sacred image of the sacred images of the great one."Cannibal Hymn,
§ 407a & b.This expression is a double superlative. Pharaoh overpowers the powers
and is the image of images. In hieroglyphic writing, image and power act
together. In the divine sphere, the image (statue, representation, figure) of
the god is the place for the Ka of the god to dwell in. Present in its image or
statue (its mouth opened so it could speak), the deity interacts -during the
cult- with
Pharaoh or his representatives. The deities are powerful sacred
images, but Pharaoh overpowers their power and is the sacred image of sacred
images. From Orion he receives a warrant as a great power. The "image"
suggested here is that of a hawk, allowing for the alternative translation :
"Hawk of Hawk, the Great Hawk of the Hawks". The "hawk" was
indeed another name for male gods (a female god is indicated by an erect
cobra). Since Predynastic times, Horus was the oldest and greatest god, the spirit of
that which is above (cf. Pharaoh as the "Follower of Horus").

The principle behind this formidable power & image is Pharaoh's stability,
continuity & tenacity. Both his dignities and chosen seat withstand all evil
deeds. The limit of his power and image is everlastingness (Nun itself). Pharaoh ever rises
and lasting lasts (in the eternal repetition of himself to be compared with the
continuous creation of the Ennead by Atum in the "zep tepy", the first time).
The Cannibal Hymn ends by confirming the general idea of the text : the
soul and spirits of the deities are eaten to assure the everlasting endurance of
Pharaoh in the sky and "in this land".
He is a unique "Akh" among the "Akhu". He is both on Earth as in the sky.

Although the text repeats Pharaoh lives off the deities, and actually
states he "lived on the being of every god", it is likely
that those gods & goddesses, as well as the Kas which were over him when he
appeared as the Bull of the sky, were exempt.
The father of Pharaoh (Atum-Re) was downgraded (Pharaoh is mightier) but
apparently not
eaten. Obviously, all those preoccupied with the preparations of the divine meal
itself escaped the cut and pot too. Earth-god Geb is placed behind Pharaoh. Orion,
called "the father of the gods" (probably Osiris) gave him a warrant.
Pharaoh considered that he was able to judge himself and award himself heavenly
bliss. But he did weigh his words in the company of
the hidden Amun. All these
divinities did not stand in Pharaoh's way. Only Orion and the Hidden were
conceived as Pharaoh's fellow super-powers.

3.4 The phenomenology of the
divine.

The natural order ("maat") emerged out of the chaos
("Nun") of the primodial ocean of pre-creation, "before
anything came into existence". This ever-emergent order was establised upon
the risen land, the primordial hill (mount) composed of elements which co-exist
in a state of constant interaction and over which a radiant Sun poured its
self-begotten light (Re as the final manifestation of Atum when the Ennead is
completed). The life-force animating these elements could be strong
or weak. Strong elements reigned with an extraordinary power at their disposal.
Such a powerful being was called a "neter", a "god". The more
powerful a deity was, the more universal its (magical) field of action and the
more exhalted the rank of its name and soul.

"Les dieux sont, pour
les Égyptiens, des puissances qui expliquent le monde mais ne demandent pas,
elles, à être élucidées parce qu'elles véhiculent une information en un
langage qu'il est possible de comprendre de manière directe : celui du mythe.
Chaque mythe ne révèle ni n'interprète qu'une partie de la réalité, mais la
totalité des dieux et de leurs relations les uns avec les autres révèle et
interprète la réalité complète du monde." -
Hornung, 1986, p.238.
Already in
Early Dynastic times, "minor" deities of
"local" importance (cf. tribal, totem-gods & goddesses) and
"major" or "national" gods can be distinguished. The Late &
Terminal Predynastic, if not earlier, saw the
consolidation of both Lunar Hathor (as the "great sorceress" of the sacred feminine
rooted in the Neolithic and Upper Paleaolithic) and Solar
Horus (as the overseeing, witnessing male sky-god). With Pharaoh assimilating the sacred feminine,
but not completely, the king became divine because he is a "Follower of Horus". This tendency to assimilate the
divine feminine moved hand in hand with the emergence of Pharaonic power, prestige and
tenacity. The cult of the overseeing Horus got associated with the power of the
encompassing, self-created (autogenetic) Sun-god Atum-Re, and surely by the IVth
Dynasty, if not earlier, the Solarization of Pharaoh was a fact.

The son of Atum-Re is "mightier" than his father. With this statement, the
divinity of Pharaoh outrankes the gods & goddesses, restricted to the
domain of existence and creation. Atum-Re is the first of the gods. This
bisexual and auto-erotical god is the sole, self-begotten, autogenetic
(fugal) creator of differentiated beings, who -in the "first time"-
eternally split into Shu (space, order) and Tefnut (moist, life). Pharaoh, his
son, incarnated in a physical body returns to his father. And because of his
terrestrial voyage, Pharaoh becomes higher than his father, the last of the gods
(in
sapiental literature and in
Ptahhotep in particular, the theme of the son outranking his father
is common - cf. the phrase "son of man").

Of all the deities called in,
only the Hidden one (and perhaps Osiris) are Pharaoh's equal. In the procession of
the gods, on the day of the divine meal, Pharaoh sat before Geb to weigh his own
words. Thoth is not invoked, for Pharaoh can do this by himself. Nevertheless,
this weighing took place together with, in the company of the Hidden (Amun ?) ...
Elsewhere in the Pyramid Texts we read :

"They tell Re that you
have come, O Pharaoh, as the son of Geb upon the throne of Amun." - Faulkner,
1969, p.234,
Utterance 579, § 1540a-b, in Pepi.
The stages of this process of Pharaonic deification can be summarized as follows :

Pharaoh realizes he
possesses "power" and attributes this to his sacred (feminine)
origin and the overseeing, witnessing capacities of the male sky-god Horus ;

Pharaoh affirms that he is a
natural principle in his own right, incarnating continuity, tenacity and sole
rulership on Earth as "Follower of Horus" ;

Pharaoh is
worshipped as the unique "son of Re" ;

In the afterlife, Pharaoh's
divine meal is composed of the souls, spirits, magic & power of the deities ;

Because Pharaoh had his
divine meal, he becomes a super-power knowing, except for the Hidden
dimension of divinity, no equal.

This development indicates
the final goal of Pharaoh is not the crown of creation (the "summum
ens" of the monadic principle of creation), but strives to move beyond the
cosmic frame and break its ultimate barrier (between presence and absence).
Pharaoh is mightier than Atum-Re, his father, because, although his origin is without
time, i.e. before time (and space), he returns from a place no deity
visits, i.e. the Earth.
Pharaoh is not content with the order of creation, but eventually tries to
encompass existence as well as preexistence (as does the
great
magician).

To Pharaoh belongs everything, and so his principle transcends
the boundaries of creation and roots Pharaonic rule in the
primordial chaos itself ; Pharaoh is part of the eternal repetition in
everlastingness. By transcending the natural order, the "great power" is realized,
and the "image of images" is established for ever and ever (i.e. in
eternity-in-everlastingness - cf.
Amduat).